The Burroughs boys soccer team plans to meet its goals in the 2013-14 season by taking a simplified approach. The Burros have nowhere to go but up headed into the new campaign.

"It's a clean slate, and we're completely ready to test ourselves this year and see how far we've come from last year," Burros head coach Sean Waldron said. "They're confident, excited, and ready to play."

Last season Burroughs went winless in 18 matches, dropping 17 straight after a scoreless tie in its season opener. The Burros' lack of success came from a lack of teamwork and the absence of a solid game plan.

"Most of the players didn't have enough previous experience to compete with our opponents," Waldron said. "I've seen a big growth from a great number of the players between this season and last season."

Burroughs plans to improve on a rough 2012-13 campaign this season, and it starts with a focused game plan. The Burros will play a task-based style of soccer this year, a simplified strategy that breaks the game down into smaller, manageable objectives.

"We focus on one job at a time and execute that correctly. It keeps the team more focused and helps them play less with their emotions and more with their skills," Waldron said. "They'll stay more united as a team — we won't have guys yelling and screaming at each other for doing the wrong thing."

The Burros will run a 4-3-3 formation this season, a switch from the 4-4-2 they employed last season. The new formation should create more structure and organization on the field.

"It creates a structural awareness of where they need to be — it's a little bit simpler," Waldron said. "The general idea in that most everything goes into the midfield first and can be distributed by the center midfielder from there."

Burroughs' top returning players include seniors Jesus Estabanjuan, Patrick Nazeck, Greg Ostrom, Brandon Paulsen, Jeff Sutton and Mitchell Welsh, along with juniors Daniel Prescott and Eric McWhorter. The Burros' best newcomer is forward Juan Guerrero, a senior that attended Mesquite High last year to focus on his schoolwork.

The Burros have shown improvement throughout the offseason, but still have areas they need to work on with the season approaching. Burroughs has made set plays a point of emphasis in practice, an area of the game the team lacked a plan for last season.

"We have been working on corner kicks, so they have a structured idea of what they want to do each and every time they take a corner kick from now on," Waldron said. "That's something that we lacked last year, and we've fixed that hole halfway at least."

Burroughs kicks off the season at Tehachapi on Tuesday, Dec. 3, the first of four straight road games. The Burros' first home game is Dec. 19 against Silverado.

Page 2 of 2 - "There's a good focus from the group and they're all really excited about the season," Waldron said. "They're looking forward to improving as individuals and as a team, and that's what we need to do."